WEATHER BY THE NUMBERS--9/26/06 Edition

* 51,720 square miles is the land area of Alabama. We rank 29th in the 50 states

* 0 is how many times I have been to New Market, NE of Huntsville, even though I was born in this state and never lived anywhere else

* 27 below zero was the temperature there on the morning of January 30, 1966. That is the lowest official temperature on record in Alabama

* 139 degrees is how much higher the temperature was in Centreville on September 5, 1925 as the all-time high for the state of Alabama (112 degrees) was recorded

* 231 mph was a wind-gust atop Mt. Washington, New Hampshire on April 12, 1934. It is the world record

* 47 below zero is the lowest temperature on record on Mt. Washington in January, 1934

* 72 is their all-time high in June 2003. Can you imagine living where it has never been above 72 degrees. Margie Richardson, our 33/40 Skywatcher for Rainbow City would make hot chocolate by the gallons

* 566 inches of snow is the most ever for one season on Mount Washington

* 1994 is the year that doppler radar was installed at the Birmingham NWS Office at Shelby County Airport

* 9/14/1895 was when the first Weather Bureau Agency was established in Birmingham. Ben Jacobs was the observer and the weather office was in his furniture store

* 1882 however, was the first year that official weather records started in Birmingham, various co-op weather observers

* 366 inches is how much rain fell in only one month at Cherrapunji, India

*1,042 inches fell there in one year, most ever world-wide. Most of it in only six months. That is about 20 times the normal annual rainfall for Birmingham

* 10 is how many times the temperature was 100 or higher in Cullman in July, 1952, during a severe Alabama heat wave and drought. It was 110 degrees in Cullman on July 30. Many wells went dry in Alabama that had never been dry before

* 3 is how many cups of coffee I have had today--a near record low. I have no idea why I have decreased my coffee drinking. It is a mystery

* 1 dozen is how many highly illegal, sinful frosted-brown-sugar-cinnamon poptarts bought today. Throwing a big party to honor the arrival of autumn--even though we are 26 days late. Do you get the idea that I live a very simple (but greatly enjoyable) life?

* 2/17/26 is the date of the most deadly avalanche in Utah. It occurred in Bingham Canyon and killed 36 people

* 1816 is a famous year for weather in much of the world. It has always been known as the year without a summer. Very few people had settled west of the Mississippi River at that time so must of the weather data was in the Eastern USA.

* 4 nights in a row in June had a severe frost from Canada down into Virginia. The history of Madison County, N.Y., tells a story of frosts in all 12 months that year.

* 1815 is the year that powerful volcano, Tamboro, erupted on the island of Sumbawa in Indonesia on April 15. Volcanic dust circulating around the globe is credited with the cause

* 66 times is how many times Little Miss Molly stopped, reversed, or left the half-mile walking track this morning to inspect things. (I actually counted them) Sometimes just a lone leaf in the grass. If our tracks could be mapped, it would look like a big jig-saw puzzle. I felt like a yo-yo when we got home.

* 5 is the estimated number of TYPOS in this post, but I don't have time to change them


Posted by   www
on September 26, 2006, 10:21 am
Mikey, you are correct. Maybe I should add this :

DISCLAIMER! There may be errors in this reply. Any errors or "typos" you find were also found by me less than 10 minutes after I sent it out. As far as spelling is concerned, Mark Twain once said, I feel bad for the man that can't spell a word more than one way.

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Posted by   www
on September 26, 2006, 10:23 am
Mikey, you are correct. I need to add this disclaimer to all of my posts!

DISCLAIMER! There may be errors in this message. Any errors or "typos" you find were also found by me less than 10 minutes after I sent it out. As far as spelling is concerned, Mark Twain once said, I feel bad for the man that can't spell a word more than one way.

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Posted by Craig  
on September 26, 2006, 11:10 am
Great stuff JB!! I'm fascinated by the Mt. Washington stuff... always impressed how windy it is there. Never been. Been to Mt. Mitchell in NC and it is VERY windy there too, but nothing like Mt. Washington. By the way, what was the radar like before Doppler? What was it called? I know, I'm showing my age (or lack thereof).

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Posted by  
on September 26, 2006, 11:21 am
Thanks, Craig. A heads up: David Black and Brian Peters are planning for us to interview one of the observers on Mount Washington soon. (On WeatherBrains) Should be quite interesting.

Before doppler, the NWS Radar was called WSR-57 and it was set up on a grid basis nationwide. To fit in the grid spacing, our installation was about 50 miles SW of Birmingham on a higher elevation area SW of Brent.

Before that...we finally got an old WSR-3 radar while still at Birmingham Airport. It was archaic by today's standards.

Even before that, when I began working at the U.S Weather Bureau at Birmingham Airport in 1957...there was none, zip, zero. There was radar in the "radar shack" in the rear of the FAA Control Tower. It was used for air-traffic control but of course, it picked up precipitation/thunderstorms also.

Hope this helps...

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Posted by  
on September 26, 2006, 11:39 am
And before that, JB had a crystal ball, and a keen eye. :)

JB, ironically my coffee consumtion has decreased also... maybe its that time of year or something.
If PopTarts and Coffee are your only addictions, (besides weather), consider yourself lucky.



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Posted by  
on September 26, 2006, 12:14 pm
Didn't know the Mt. Washington record still stood, J.B...did the 318 mph they measured by radar in the OKC tornado in 1999 not count?

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Posted by   www
on September 26, 2006, 12:44 pm
You wrote:* 5 is the estimated number of TYPOS in this post, but I don't have time to change them .

JB,

Per Microsoft word grammer check, you are correct, 5 errors!

Catch you later....

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Posted by Mikey  
on September 26, 2006, 1:20 pm
Too bad the grammar check wasn't run on the post to check "grammer". People who can't spell it shouldn't check it.

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Posted by  
on September 26, 2006, 3:40 pm
Hey! I am from the New Market area. I went to Highschool there, Buckhorn High. There is a nice park there (Sharon Johnson). I now reside in Helena, Alabama. New Market, has got to be one of the smallest towns in the state.

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Posted by  
on September 26, 2006, 5:43 pm
Ok - I know this is a dumb question, but how many SEC National Championships does Auburn have? Is it one (in 1957) or none? Since we were talking numbers I needed to ask. I can't ask any of my Auburn friends ... Thanks

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Posted by  
on September 26, 2006, 8:52 pm
lol, JB!! You are right...I would make it by the gallons!! YUM, YUM!!

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Posted by  
on September 26, 2006, 10:14 pm
.....As an Auburn nut who's been around since *almost* 1957, I can tell you that there's no such thing as an SEC National Championship. As for so-called-mythical national championships, since 1957, I can report that Auburn has had two. There is, of course, the 1993 team that went 11-0, the only division 1-A team to do so that year. The AP media rated that team only number four in the nation. And there's the 2004 team that finished 13-0, and was ignored by the BCS.

.....As to official SEC championships, Auburn earned those in 1983, 1987, 1988, 1989, and 2004. After the 1957 award, of course. Frankly, 5 out of 6 against UAT in recent years blows any of that tripe away, in this Tiger's opinion! After two decades of hearing "roll tide" every time I picked up the phone in December...

War Eagle!

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Posted by  
on September 26, 2006, 10:18 pm
.....I'd also like to point out that Auburn football was awarded a national championship in 1983, by, of all things, the New York Times. In the human polls, we were leap-frogged by No. 5 Miami, who (prior to the bowls) had played only two teams with winning records. (And finished with a loss and a tie.) Auburn beat nine bowl teams that year...

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